Happy Friday! Another busy week at Bowen is behind us! We had multiple field trips, a visit from the Caterpillar Lab (complete with some creepy, crawly creatures!), math MCAS testing, a whole-school assembly led by the 2nd grade...and that’s just scratching the surface! Time is just flying by as we head into the final stretch of the 2016-2017 school year, but even so, it’s important to stop every so often, look around at all of the great things going on, and enjoy every minute of it! Thank you for everything you do to help your children learn and grow as part of the Bowen community. We hope that you have a wonderful weekend, and we will see you bright and early on Monday!

Yours truly,

Diana & Tiffany

News You Need to Know

2017-2018 Placement Information - Due Monday

During the months of May and June, we will begin our work to create balanced classrooms for the next school year. An important part of this process is the feedback we request from you as parents/guardians regarding your child’s learning style, goals you have for your child, and social information regarding his/her peers. Attached is a copy of the placement form (originally sent home last Friday) Optional Placement Form that you may use to give us feedback regarding your child that will help us in our process. This optional form will need to be
returned to school by Monday, May 8th. We are sorry that we cannot accept late placement forms.

School Council Meeting Summary

To begin our School Council meeting time together and continue to make connections with each other we played a Bowen version of “Bubble Talk.” Each member selected a picture of an animal in a silly or unexpected position to create a quote or “meme” to connect the animal’s action to how the member was feeling.

For the discussion part of the meeting, we reflected on last month’s budget presentation. We believe that the format and presentation was thoughtful and clear. We also discussed a recommendation for the school council to preview the proposed budget prior to the community presentation to identify ways that our community may prepare to share ideas and advocate at the presentation.

We also finalized the responses to questions shared in the this year’s annual family survey. Please read the attached document to read some of the questions and responses. Survey Responses This document captures themes and questions that were asked on multiple surveys. As a school council we also discussed how this information could be used to create a Bowen FAQ. In order for the FAQ to be relevant we still need to identify how the FAQ will be regularly updated as well as address some technology questions to ensure it is a tool improving communication not discouraging communication.

Please remember that all Bowen School Council meetings are open to the Bowen community. The last School Council meeting of the year is Friday, May 26 at 7:30 a.m. Feel free to join us!

Bowen Baggies for Books - A Note from Mrs. Mason

Please help us add more books to the Bowen School Library by participating in “Bowen Baggies for Books”. The fifth grade students will be giving out baggies to all of the Bowen students. Students should fill the baggies with money! The money will be used to buy books such as Big Nate and Toon Books! The class who donates the most money will be the class to check out the books for the first time. And there's more... if we raise over $3,000, Mrs. Mason will add blue to her hair. We will collect money from May 1st to May 12th.

Thank you for helping make our library a better place!

Mrs. Mason & The Fifth Grade Students

Staffing Updates

Ollie MacFadden, our music teacher, will be taking a short-term medical leave. Cards and warm wishes from students can be given to the office and will be passed along. Please join us in wishing him well! We are currently in the process of looking for a substitute for our music classes and will keep you updated.

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